TestDiet - Diet Details

SELECTING PROPER Purified Diets
Purified diets are manufactured using highly refined ingredients in which each nutrient is provided from a specific ingredient (for example, protein from casein or soy, carbohydrate from corn starch or sucrose, fat from soybean or corn oil). Purified diets can be ideal in evaluating specific nutrient levels, excesses, deficiencies, or other targeted amounts, as individual sources of the desired nutrient can be modified easily without drastic impact to other aspects of the diet. For example, purified diets are ideal for nutrient deficiency studies because most nutrients can be easily eliminated from the diet by removing the sole source. Purified diets are also ideal for targeting high levels of nutrients. The source of a nutrient can easily be substituted (i.e. fish oil for soy oil) to change the fundamental components within a nutrient category. More control over the diet composition allows for a better experimental diet to control match, thus eliminating the diet as a source of variation in statistical analysis.

Because of the level of purity in purified ingredients, other non-nutritive dietary factors are also greatly minimized or eliminated. Two such cases are phytoestrogens (isoflavones) which can impact certain areas of research, and chlorophyl which causes the gut of the animal to autofluoresce, creating interference in in vivo imaging studies.

TestDiet® purified diets are produced according to open formulas that do not vary from batch to batch. The specific ingredients, amounts of each, and expected nutrient content will remain constant. Properly cited purified formulas can be easily replicated or modified for future studies. TestDiet® can formulate diets based on existing TestDiet® products, published formulas, a diet originally produced by another manufacturer, or an entirely new formula based on your research needs. Purified diets are available for a wide array of species and product forms (pelleted, meal, tablet).

Fundamental principles of purified diets are:
- Full knowledge of all ingredients (open formula)
- Precise nutrient composition (less variation within raw materials)
- Easy modification
- Consistent
- Repeatable
Selecting the proper control diet is of utmost importance for research integrity and the ability to publish your work. Often, it is best to look in the literature to see what base diet was used in similar research. That said, if your baseline research was conducted on a grain-based diet, you would want to be careful about switching to a purified diet. It is not ideal to compare results obtained when animals were on a grain-based diet with results of animals fed a purified diet. You can make comparisons, but the diet would be an unknown variable in that situation given the differences in ingredients, nutrient profile and bioavailability as well as any non-nutritive factors (i.e. difference in phytoestrogen levels). Thus, if you want to use a purified experimental diet it is strongly recommended to use a purified control diet that uses the same ingredients.

Please consult with a nutritionist about the best control diet for your TestDiet custom product.
Baseline Purified
The “AIN” diets were published by the American Institute of Nutrition (now the American Society for Nutrition–ASN), based on extensive research and a broad collaboration of researchers. The number in the name indicates the year the formula was published, with the AIN-93M (Maintenance) and AIN-93G (Growth) formulated to be improvements upon the AIN-76A. These formulas are the founding purified diet formulas upon which countless customized research diets are based upon.

TestDiet^® developed another purified diet formula, known as the Basal Purified Diet (5755), which has also been a baseline formula for numerous research-specific diets. Using purified diet formulas gives us the highest level of control over the nutrient composition, allowing for easy modification to delete or adjust targeted nutrients with little impact over the remainder of the diet. Selecting the proper control diet is of utmost importance for research integrity and the ability to publish your work. Please ask a nutritionist about the best control diet for your TestDiet custom product.

Reeves, P.G., F.H. Nielsen, and G.C. Fahey, Jr. 1993. AIN-93 purified diets for laboratory rodents: Final report of the American Institute of Nutrition and ad hoc writing committee on the reformulation of the AIN-76A diet. J. Nutr. 123:1939-1951
DIO/Western/Ketogenic
Purina TestDiet® can produce a multitude of formulas for research in obesity, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and related diseases – and can produce custom variations to meet your specific research needs. We have created high fat diets for many species, including rodents, pigs, primates, and dogs.

Table: Fatty Acid Profiles of Commonly Used Fat Sources in Laboratory Animal Diets
- DIO Van Heek
  This diet series was first introduced in 1997 by Van Heek et al. in the J. Clinical Investigation. The diets are based on the AIN-76A Semi-Purified Diet with lard as the predominate source of fat and no added fiber. Mineral and vitamin premixes are included in higher quantities in the high fat diets than the controls to promote adequate micronutrient intake during anticipated regulation of caloric intake.
  
  Meakin P.J., Harper A.J., Hamilton D.L., et al. 2012. Reduction in BACE1 decreases body weight, protects against diet-induced obesity and enhances insulin sensitivity in mice. Biochem. J. 441; 285–296.
  
  Mitsutake S., Date T., Yokota H., et al. 2012. Ceramide kinase deficiency improves diet-induced obesity and insulin resistance. FEBS Lett. 586; 1300–1305.
  
  Salmon A.B., Flores L.C., Li Y., et al. 2012. Reduction of glucose intolerance with high fat feeding is associated with anti-inflammatory effects of thioredoxin 1 overexpression in mice. Pathobiology of Aging & Age-related Diseases 2; 10.3402/pba.v2i0.17101.
  
  Zhang C., McFarlane C., Lokireddy S., et al. 2012. Inhibition of myostatin protects against diet-induced obesity by enhancing fatty acid oxidation and promoting a brown adipose phenotype in mice. Diabetologia 55; 183–193.
  
  Martínez-Carrillo B.E., Zúñiga-Torres M.G., Jarillo-Luna R.A., et al. 2011. Effect of exercise and high carbohydrates diet in the T-lymphocytes of Peyer’s patches of Balb/c mice. Proceedings of the Nutrition Society 70; E39.
  
  Tomada I., Tomada N., Almeida H., Neves D. 2011. Energy restriction and exercise modulate angiopoietins and vascular endothelial growth factor expression in the cavernous tissue of high-fat diet-fed rats. Asian J. Androl. 14; 635-642.
  
  Zhang C., McFarlane C., Lokireddy S., et al. 2011. Myostatin-deficient mice exhibit reduced insulin resistance through activating the AMP-activated protein kinase signaling pathway. Diabetologia 54; 1491–1501.
  
  Zúñiga-Torres M.G., Martínez-Carrillo B.E., Jarillo-Luna R.A., et al. 2011. Effect of high fat diet and moderate exercise on T-lymphocytes of Peyer’s patches mice. Proceedings of the Nutrition Society 70; E48.
  
  Gaidhu M.P., Anthony N.M., Patel P., et al. 2010. Dysregulation of lipolysis and lipid metabolism in visceral and subcutaneous adipocytes by high-fat diet: role of ATGL, HSL, and AMPK. Am. J. Physiol. Cell Physiol. 298; C961–971.
  
  Feher A., Rutkai I., Beleznai T., et al. 2010. Caveolin-1 limits the contribution of BK(Ca) channel to EDHF-mediated arteriolar dilation: implications in diet-induced obesity. Cardiovasc. Res. 87; 732–739.
  
  Prieto D., Kaminski P.M., Bagi Z., et al. 2010. Hypoxic relaxation of penile arteries: involvement of endothelial nitric oxide and modulation by reactive oxygen species. Am. J. Physiol. Heart Circ. Physiol. 299; H915–924.
  
  van den Broek N.M.A., Ciapaite J., De Feyter H.M.M.L., et al. 2010. Increased mitochondrial content rescues in vivo muscle oxidative capacity in long-term high-fat-diet-fed rats. FASEB J. 24; 1354–1364.
  
  Yamada P.M., Mehta H.H., Hwang D., et al. 2010. Evidence of a role for insulin-like growth factor binding protein (IGFBP)-3 in metabolic regulation. Endocrinology 151; 5741–5750.
- DIO Surwit Series
  Developed in 1992 by Professor Richard Surwit at Duke University for diet-induced obesity and diabetic studies. This diet series is based on the AIN-76A Semi-Purified Diet to be high in saturated fat with hydrogenated coconut oil as the main fat source. It also contains no added fiber. Mineral and vitamin premixes are included in higher quantities in the high fat diets than the controls to promote adequate micronutrient intake during anticipated regulation of caloric intake.
  
  Jheng H-F., Tsai P-J., Guo S-M., et al. 2012. Mitochondrial fission contributes to mitochondrial dysfunction and insulin resistance in skeletal muscle. Mol. Cell. Biol. 32; 309–319.
  
  Lee R.K., Hittel D.S., Nyamandi V.Z., et al. 2012. Unconventional microarray design reveals the response to obesity is largely tissue specific: analysis of common and divergent responses to diet-induced obesity in insulin-sensitive tissues. Appl. Physiol. Nutr. Metab. 37; 257–268.
  
  Meoli L. 2012. Comprehensive Phenotyping of Two Mouse Mutants Reveals a Potential Novel Role of G Protein-coupled Receptor 30. Ph.D thesis. Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.
  
  Caton P.W., Kieswich J., Yaqoob M.M., et al. 2011. Metformin opposes impaired AMPK and SIRT1 function and deleterious changes in core clock protein expression in white adipose tissue of genetically-obese db/db mice. Diabetes Obes. Metab. 13; 1097–1104.
  
  Duggan G.E., Hittel D.S., Sensen C.W., et al. 2011. Metabolomic response to exercise training in lean and diet-induced obese mice. J. Appl. Physiol. 110; 1311–1318.
  
  Duggan G.E., Hittel D.S., Hughey C.C., et al. 2011. Differentiating short- and long-term effects of diet in the obese mouse using (1) H-nuclear magnetic resonance metabolomics. Diabetes Obes. Metab. 13; 859–862.
  
  Shearer J., Severson DL., Su L., et al. 2009. Partial A1 adenosine receptor agonist regulates cardiac substrate utilization in insulin-resistant rats in vivo. J. Pharmacol. Exp. Ther. 328; 306–311.
  
  Tsai Y-S., Tsai P-J., Jiang M-J., et al. 2009. Decreased PPAR gamma expression compromises perigonadal-specific fat deposition and insulin sensitivity. Mol. Endocrinol. 23; 1787–1798.
  
  Shearer J., Duggan G., Weljie A., et al. 2008. Metabolomic profiling of dietary-induced insulin resistance in the high fat-fed C57BL/6J mouse. Diabetes Obes. Metab. 10; 950–958.
- DIO Basal Purified Diets
  This four-diet series is formulated with three of the diets providing similar kcal from fat as the Van Heek series but using the Basal Purified Diet (5755) as the base formula. This diet series contains fiber in the form of cellulose and fat primarily fromlard and corn oil. Mineral and vitamin premixes are included in higher quantities in the high fat diets than the controls to promote adequate micronutrient intake during anticipated regulation of caloric intake.
  
  Hageman et al. 2010. High-fat diet leads to tissue-specific changes reflecting risk factors for diseases in DBA/2J mice Physiol Genomics. 42(1): 55–66.
  
  Krisantis et al. 2022. Non-enzymatic glycoxidation linked with nutrition enhances the tumorigenic capacity of prostate cancer epithelia through AGE mediated activation of RAGE in cancer associated fibroblasts. Translational Oncology. 101350 pp 1-10
  
  Liu Tzu-Wen. 2013. Changes in fatty acid profiles after three weeks of high-fat diet feeding in obesity prone rats. Masters Thesis. University of Missouri-Columbia. pp 1-110. Liu et al. 2017. Oval Cells Contribute to Fibrogenesis of Marginal Liver Grafts under Stepwise Regulation of Aldose Reductase and Notch Signaling. Theranostics Vol. 7 (19) 4879-4893.
  
  Park et al. 2012. Physical activity opposes coronary vascular dysfunction induced during high fat feeding in mice. J Physiol 590.17 pp 4255–4268
  
  Patel R, Baker SS, Liu W, Desai S, Alkhouri R, et al. (2012) Effect of Dietary Advanced Glycation End Products on Mouse Liver. PLoS ONE 7(4): e35143. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0035143
  
  Sekar and Chow. 2014. Secretin receptor-knockout mice are resistant to high-fat diet-induced obesity and exhibit impaired intestinal lipid absorption. FASEB J. 28: 2494-2505.
  
  So et al. 2012. Silencing of lipid metabolism genes through IRE1α-mediated mRNA decay lowers plasma lipids in mice Cell Metab. 16(4): 487–499
  
  Vingtdeux et al. 2011. Small-Molecule Activators of AMP-Activated Protein Kinase (AMPK), RSVA314 and RSVA405, Inhibit Adipogenesis. Mol Med 17(9-10)1022-1030
  
  Zhao et al. 2013. Pubertal high fat diet: effects on mammary cancer development. Breast Cancer Research, 15:R100
- Western Based on AIN-93G
  There are numerous Western-type purified diets available. Western diets have moderate to high fat content and include added cholesterol with or without sodium cholate. Western diets have multiple uses such as inducing obesity, atherosclerosis, non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, osteoporosis, hypertension and other metabolic syndromes.
- Western Clinton-Cybulsky Series
  This four-diet series was introduced in 1999 and designed to evaluate the relationship between diet and genetics in atherogenic murine models. These diets were modified from the AIN-76A Semi-Purified Diet to contain cocoa butter in addition to corn oil and are free of fiber.
  
  Lichtman A.H. et al. Hyperlipidemia and Atherosclerotic Lesion Development in LDL Receptor-Deficient Mice Fed Defined Semipurified Diets with and Without Cholate. Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol. 1999;19:1938-1944.
  
  Zheng H., Zou H., Liu X., et al. 2012. Cholesterol level influences opioid signaling in cell models and analgesia in mice and humans. J. Lipid Res. 53; 1153–1162.
  
  Stephens A.M., Dean L.L., Davis J.P., et al., 2010. Peanuts, peanut oil, and fat free peanut flour reduced cardiovascular disease risk factors and the development of atherosclerosis in Syrian golden hamsters. J. Food. Sci. 75; H116–122.
- Breslow Western
  There are numerous Western-type purified diets available. Western diets have moderate to high fat content and include added cholesterol with or without sodium cholate. Western diets have multiple uses such as inducing obesity, atherosclerosis, non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, osteoporosis, hypertension and other metabolic syndromes.
  
  Nuotio-Antar et al. FABP4-Cre Mediated Expression of Constitutively Active ChREBP Protects Against Obesity, Fatty Liver, and Insulin Resistance. Endocrinology. 2015 Nov; 156(11): 4020–4032.
  
  Yang Y., Chang B., Chan L., Sustained expression of the transcription factor GLIS3 is required for normal beta cell function in adults. EMBO Mol Med (2013)5:92-104
- Western Based on AIN-76A
  There are numerous Western-type purified diets available. Western diets have moderate to high fat content and include added cholesterol with or without sodium cholate. Western diets have multiple uses such as inducing obesity, atherosclerosis, non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, osteoporosis, hypertension and other metabolic syndromes.
  
  Shelly L., Royer L., Sand T., et al. 2008. Phospholipid transfer protein deficiency ameliorates diet-induced hypercholesterolemia and inflammation in mice. J. Lipid Res. 49; 773–781.
  
  Evans M.J., Mahaney P.E., Borges-Marcucci L., et al. 2009. A synthetic farnesoid X receptor (FXR) agonist promotes cholesterol lowering in models of dyslipidemia. Am. J. Physiol. Gastrointest. Liver Physiol. 296; G543–552.
  
  Luo Y., Warren L., Xia D., et al. 2009. Function and distribution of circulating human PCSK9 expressed extrahepatically in transgenic mice. J. Lipid Res. 50; 1581–1588.
- Ketogenic Diets
  Characteristics of a ketogenic diet includes higher fat levels than Western Diets to the extent that it replaces all carbohydrates and fiber. Fat sources are solid but soft at room temperature, so the high levels of fat make ketogenic diets extremely soft with the consistency of a dough. Most ketogenic diets are unable to be pelleted, and depending on what fat source is used, may need to be hand mixed prior to feeding. Ketogenic diets can be used for multiple research applications including cancer, neuroscience and metabolism. Ketogenic diets have been widely used to study neurological disorders and diseases such as Alzheimer’s, epilepsy and autism. Ketogenic diets are also used in studying metabolic diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
Amino Acid
Amino Acid Defined Diets are chemically refined purified diets in which the protein fraction of the diet is completely made up of pure amino acids. This type of diet is important for research targeting specific amino acids, adjusting one or more individual amino acid, meanwhile keeping other amino acids or overall protein level constant. The Baker Amino Acid Diet is the most commonly used amino acid defined purified diet to use as a starting point for further modification. There are multiple ways to remove amino acids from the diet:
1. Remove the targeted amino acid(s) and increase all other amino acids proportionally so that the diet is isonitrogenous to the control.
2. Remove the targeted amino acid(s) and replace with a single amino acid (glutamic acid) so all other amino acids stay constant, and the final formula is isonitrogenous to the control.
3. Remove the targeted amino acid(s) and keep all other amino acid levels constant which would make this formulation a little lower in total protein compared to the control.
Caballero F., Fernández A., Matías N., et al. 2010. Specific contribution of methionine and choline in nutritional nonalcoholic steatohepatitis: impact on mitochondrial S-adenosyl-L-methionine and glutathione. J. Biol. Chem. 285; 18528–18536.

Gilbert E.R., Li H., Emmerson D.A., et al. 2010. Dietary protein composition influences abundance of peptide and amino acid transporter messenger ribonucleic acid in the small intestine of 2 lines of broiler chicks. Poult. Sci. 89; 1663–1676.

Hirakawa et al. 1984. Comparative utilization of a crystalline amino acid diet and a methionine fortified casein diet by young rats and mice. Nutrition Research. Vol. 4, pp. 891-895.

Kim H., Toyofuku Y., Lynn F.C., et al. 2010. Serotonin regulates pancreatic beta cell mass during pregnancy. Nat. Med. 16; 804–808.

Maddocks et al. 2013. Serine starvation induces stress and p53-dependent metabolic remodelling in cancer cells. Nature. Vol 493; 542-546.

Maddocks et al. 2017. Modulating the therapeutic response of tumors to dietary serine and glycine starvation. Nature. Vol 544; 372-378.
Other Nutrient Adjusted Formulas

SELECTING PROPER Modified Grain Diets

One of the benefits of using TestDiet^® for your custom diet needs is that we have the ability to modify our proprietary LabDiet^® formulas in various ways, including making alterations to target a different nutrient composition (with some limitations) and adding research compounds. This allows you to keep the diet as close as possible to the standard LabDiet^® product that your facility diet or animal breeder may be using. For more information on incorporating research compounds, please visit the ‘Adding Compounds to Diets’ on our Resources page.

Some common ways that our LabDiet^® formulas have been altered are removing or replacing specific ingredients, targeting a different nutrient profile, adding salt for hypertension studies, and adding cholesterol and fat for atherosclerotic studies. Please contact a Nutritionist through our Contact Us portal. We look forward to assisting you with your custom formulations.
Modified Grain Diets

SELECTING PROPER Imaging Diets

We often have questions from customers regarding which diet to choose when their experiments require fluorescence optical imaging of a live animal. The common complaint is that a grain-based diet produces background fluorescence which interferes with the experiment. This background fluorescence occurs in part because of the chlorophyll which is found in some of the diet ingredients such as alfalfa, but which also can also be found in other ingredients.

One option would be the use of purified diets, such as AIN-93M (58M1) or AIN-93G (57W5). Purified diets are created from highly refined ingredients, such as casein, corn starch, crystalline cellulose, and individual vitamins and minerals. Purified diets have historically been the ‘go to’ diets for imaging studies. Some disadvantages of using purified diets are they are more expensive, require a minimum order, have a longer lead time and have a shorter shelf life.

An alternative option to purified diets would be to use a grain-based diet that contains plant material not known to not be autofluorescent, such as soybean meal, corn and wheat. We offer a line of diets, our Verified series, that do not contain any alfalfa which allows the animals to be maintained on a more normal, standard diet, throughout the study. Based on the Li-Cor article (available on this page), 5V75 and 5K96 diets had 75-95% less fluorescence background than the alfalfa-based diets.

We also conducted our own study to determine whether a grain-based diet without alfalfa, such as 5V75, is a suitable option to purified diets in fluorescence imaging studies in order to reduce per diem costs. Animals were fed one of three diets, 58M1 (purified), 5001 (grain based with alfalfa) and 5V75 (grain-based without alfalfa) and imaged. The in vivo images were taken using the autoexposure setting for Alexa Fluor 680 (675 nm excitation to 720 nm emission; 640 nm excitation to 700 nm emission) and plum fluorescent protein markers (570 nm excitation to 640 nm emission; 605 nm excitation to 660 nm emission). The results of the study showed that 5V75 did not autofluoresce in the mice, and imaging pictures were comparable to those animals on the purified diet. Our study supports other research findings that alfalfa-free cereal grain diets can be a lower cost alternative to purified diets when conducting fluorescence imaging at certain wavelengths. More details of this study can be found in our literature “The Impact of Laboratory Animal Diets on Autofluorescence Imaging in Animals”.

Pearl^® Imager - In Vivo Animal Imaging Diet Considerations

Autofluorescence Brochure
Imaging Diets

SELECTING PROPER Liquid Diets
Liquid diets are available for multiple species for certain applications where a solid diet may not appropriate. Liquid diets can be used if an animal has trouble chewing food, as a vehicle to deliver research compounds or medications, or for other research-specific reasons like alcohol-intake studies. These diets are shipped as a powder for extended shelf life. These diets can be prepared quickly and easily using a blender. Ideally liquid diets should be prepared fresh daily, but some are micro-stabilized so that they can be prepared less frequently.

Liquid diets are nutritionally complete and designed to be fed ad libitum, meaning animals have access to the diet throughout the day. These diets are not ideal for oral gavage as they are nutritionally diluted for suspension in water and easy flow through the delivery system. The amount of liquid diet required to feed each day would be labor intensive for animal care staff and would put an undue amount of stress on the animal if trying to deliver via oral gavage. Specialized liquid feeders are available for purchase through other vendors.

For rodents, the most common liquid diets are the Lieber-DeCarli formulas, originally developed by Charles Lieber and Leonore DeCarli in 1982. These diets allow for the prolonged exposure of alcohol in a rodent model and allows for modification to calories provided by ethanol.

*Include liquid diet spec sheets*

Ma K., Hu Y., Smith D.E. 2012. Influence of fed-fasted state on intestinal PEPT1 expression and in vivo pharmacokinetics of glycylsarcosine in wild-type and Pept1 knockout mice. Pharm. Res. 29; 535–545.

Bruijnzeel A.W., Small E., Pasek T.M., Yamada H. 2010. Corticotropin-releasing factor mediates the dysphoria-like state associated with alcohol withdrawal in rats. Behav. Brain. Res. 210; 288–291.

Perrone E.E., Chen C., Longshore S.W., et al. 2010. Dietary bile acid supplementation improves intestinal integrity and survival in a murine model. J. Pediatr. Surg. 45; 1256–1265.

Romick-Rosendale L.E., Goodpaster A.M., Hanwright P.J., et al. 2009. NMR-based metabonomics analysis of mouse urine and fecal extracts following oral treatment with the broad-spectrum antibiotic enrofloxacin (Baytril). Magn. Reson. Chem. 47; S36–46.

Rylkova D., Shah H.P., Small E., Bruijnzeel A.W. 2009. Deficit in brain reward function and acute and protracted anxiety-like behavior after discontinuation of a chronic alcohol liquid diet in rats. Psychopharmacology (Berl.) 203; 629–640.

Wu Q., Boyle M.P., Palmiter R.D. 2009. Loss of GABAergic signaling by AgRP neurons to the parabrachial nucleus leads to starvation. Cell 137; 1225–1234.

Zhao L., Cheng Z., Dhall D., et al. 2009. A novel corrective pullthrough surgery in a mouse model of Hirschsprung’s disease. J. Pediatr. Surg. 44; 759–766.

Ootsuka Y., Blessing W.W., Steiner A.A., Romanovsky A.A. 2008. Fever response to intravenous prostaglandin E2 is mediated by the brain but does not require afferent vagal signaling. Am. J. Physiol. Regul. Integr. Comp. Physiol. 294; R1294–1303.

Phillips C.T., Palmiter R.D. 2008. Role of agouti-related protein-expressing neurons in lactation. Endocrinology 149; 544–550.

Wu Q., Howell M.P., Cowley M.A., Palmiter R.D. 2008. Starvation after AgRP neuron ablation is independent of melanocortin signaling. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 105; 2687–2692.

Yang H., McNearney T.A., Chu R., et al. 2008. Enkephalin-encoding herpes simplex virus-1 decreases inflammation and hotplate sensitivity in a chronic pancreatitis model. Mol. Pain. 4; 8.
Liquid Diets

SELECTING PROPER Gel Diets
There are many scenarios in a laboratory setting where feeding a diet in gel form is advantageous. Gel diets are also useful in situations where the animal may not be able to break apart a solid pellet but feeding a meal is too messy or challenging because of the feeding system within cages. Another use is in-facility integration of compounds when working with a research compound that we cannot handle, either for personnel safety concerns or if we are otherwise prohibited from handling the compound. Whatever the reason, TestDiet® can provide gel diets that best fits your research needs whether it is a proprietary LabDiet® formula or any purified diet formula.

Gel diets manufactured at TestDiet® are provided in powder form. The diet has longer stability in powdered form than as a prepared gel. The diet must be mixed with boiling or near-boiling water to activate the gelatin in the diet. The diet mixture then needs to be cooled in the refrigerator or freezer to set. An advantage of using a gel is the ability to cut into specific shapes or increments for feeding. Ice cube trays are often used for easy management and feeding allocation. Trays with fun shapes can be used as an added level of enrichment when working with non-human primates.

Please contact us with any questions regarding a custom gel diet for your research needs.

Gel Diets Instructions & Benefits

Gel Diet Instruction Video
Gel Diets
- 573B - Mod LabDiet 5001/5L0D, Gel
- 5WJ1 - Mod LabDiet 5P00 Gel

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